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Confederacy of Vulcan
The Confederacy of Vulcan was the governing body of the Vulcan civilization in the science fiction franchise Star Trek. It is also one of the founding members of the United Federation of Planets. History Early history Vulcan society was once extremely violent, even compared to the war-torn history of Humanity. Millennia ago, the species were driven by their emotions and were prone to paranoia and aggression, engaging in near-constant warfare among themselves. As their technology advanced, it was feared that the Vulcans would eventually destroy themselves. In an effort to avoid this fate, a Vulcan named Surak developed a new philosophy, thereby igniting the Time of Awakening. Surak maintained that the root cause of all the problems on Vulcan lay in the uncontrolled outpouring of the people's emotions. His followers swore to live their lives by an ethical system devised by Surak and based purely on logical principles with emotions being controlled and repressed. Surak's philosophy was not well-received by certain groups, such as the Children of Ket-Cheleb who believed that the Vulcans' passions should be embraced rather than shunned. As the philosophy of cthia spread throughout Vulcan society, a large number of Vulcans took part in a mass exodus from their homeworld, seeking out a new home where they could live their lives without the need to repress their desires and emotions. Some of these Vulcans-in-exile would go on to establish the Romulan culture, forming a militant empire based on ethnocentricity and xenophobia. Humanity and the Federation From as early as the 19th century, the Vulcans had been observing activity on Earth, watching Humanity develop. Regarding mankind as too primitive due to its neglect of its homeworld and its frequent conflicts, the Vulcans avoided making contact for over two hundred years since beginning their surveys of Earth. They would finally make contact with Humanity in the Earth year 2063 AD after witnessing the species' first warp flight. The Vulcans would offer limited support to Humanity as it steadily recovered from its Third World War, though it would take several decades yet for mankind to unite under a single flag. They refused to provide their technology to Earth, which resulted in Earth's first warp five starship launching a century after Humanity first developed warp technology. For some Humans, this was a source of much resentment as they believed that the Vulcans had impeded their progress. This was not entirely inaccurate; the Vulcans believed that mankind was not ready for the dangers inherent in exploring other worlds and intended to curtail their expansion and establishment in the galactic neighborhood until they were deemed ready. By the 2150's, United Earth had taken its place on the galactic stage while the Vulcan Confederacy was engaged in hostile relations with the Andorian Empire. While reluctant to allow Humanity to begin its period of exploration, the Vulcans consented to the launch of the Enterprise NX-01 in order to avoid a diplomatic incident with the neighbouring Klingon Empire after the crash of their courier Klaang on Earth. When the Enterprise was launched, the Vulcans stationed subcommander T'Pol on the ship to aid and monitor the humans' journey. Inside the Vulcan government, the Vulcan High Command grew in power, with Administrator V'Las attempting to persecute the new Syrrannite movement. By 2154, V'Las attempted to provoke a war with the Andorian Empire, stating that intelligence had gathered evidence of the Andorians using Xindi technology to create a superweapon that would be used to destroy Vulcan. Trying to frame the Syrranites, V'Las had the Earth Embassy on Vulcan bombed, which brought the Enterprise to Vulcan to investigate. Not long after, the Enterprise discovered the truth of the matter, and Commander Charles Tucker III and Ambassador Soval went to warn the Andorians of the impending invasion. Meanwhile, on Vulcan, Captain Archer discovered the Kir'Shara. With V'Las's deception uncovered he was forced from power, while the discovery of the Kir'Shara brought about a new age in Vulcan history as the Vulcan people rediscovered the true uncorrupted teachings of Surak. In 2155, the Vulcans entered into a wartime alliance with United Earth, the Andorian Empire and the United Planets of Tellar, forming the Coalition of Planets. The Coalition's formation was in response to increased aggression from the Romulan Star Empire, which sought to expand its territory through the conquest of its neighbouring systems. After almost six years, the Romulan War would end with the Coalition's victory. In 2161, Vulcan and the other Coalition members would join to form the United Federation of Planets. Vulcan was almost chosen as the Federation's capital world, but the Vulcan Council were concerned that this would potentially harm their society after centuries of following Surak's logical principles and cause them to regress. Ultimately, Earth was selected as the Federation's capital, highlighting Humanity's pride and curiousity as vital qualities that could be harnessed for the UFP. Politics The Confederacy of Vulcan was governed by the Vulcan High Council, a group of just seven ministers, each responsible for a different ministry. Elections were held every ten years, with candidates selected logically on their merit for the job. Other governing bodies were the High Assembly and the Vulcan High Command, with the Vulcan High Command's Administrator functioning as head of government, governing with the approval of the Council. The head of government also took the title of Vulcan First Minister. he seven ministries were the Ministry of State, Defense, Security, Trade, Thought, Science, and Health. Each maintained various agencies to carry out its functions. In matters such as legislation and debate on important issues were handled by three different bodies. One such body is the Proposal Group which exists alongside the Rectification Group and the hr'Khash'te; also known as the Expunging Group. The Expunging Group exists only to remove or veto laws which provide an easy manner for change. The other two groups require a large majority to pass legislation with expunction requiring only one-fourth of the body's two thousand six members to remove a law. The general idea of this would be that a good law should require a large consensus with bad laws being easy to stop and change. Though a very logical way to determine legislation, it can be exploitable depending on the many political groups that are in power on the Vulcan homeworld. Typically, debate is often a venue for discussion on the subject with a later vote on the Referendum itself. Normally, laws that are removed are done so quickly, however, a piece of legislation that widely affects Vulcan can take a week of discussions to take place. This would remain in effect until the viewers indicate that the time for debate is over and voting is made by the electorate. Votes can often be swayed by what is said in the debates themselves. The document that binds the Vulcan people to the Federation is known as the Articles of Association, also referred to as the Articles of the Federation. Military The military wing of the Vulcan government was overseen by the Ministry of Defense, one of the ministries of the Vulcan Council. The Minister of Defense served as the commander in chief of this division who supervised the deployment of the Vulcan Defense Force which served as the naval branch of the military. The V'Ket served as the army branch of the military but by latter era it served as a more ceremonial branch that made use of lirpa staves instead of phasers. They were often deployed to guard religious sites or attend special functions. In the 22nd century, before the Syrrannite Reformation, the Vulcans were noted for the use of highly trained commando units that were used to storm enemy positions.Category:Governments Category:Star Trek Category:United Federation of Planets